Any parent will know, to their cost (literally), that a young swimmer's 
street cred nowadays depends not on performance in the water, but on having 
the right collection of equipment to take to the pool. Clothes must all have 
the right logo, their other functions being of secondary importance. The 
rest of the stuff will be familiar. Several costumes (latest cut and logo of 
course), patent flannel, several towels, anti-chlorine shampoo, conditioner, 
skin care products, hair dryer, several sets of flippers -(oops sorry, 
fins), specially shaped pull buoy and kick board, several types of  paddles, 
swim mitts, heart monitor, drinking bottles, stop watch, a dozen pairs of 
goggles and two dozen swimming hats. All this requires a huge bag, which 
must also carry the logo of the moment.

I have noticed that swimming bags are inversely proportional in size to that 
of their owner. This whole trend of this equipment fetish is getting to the 
stage where I confidently predict that soon  pools will become like a 
hypermarket in reverse, with shopping trolleys available in the car park for 
the swimmers to unload their clobber to carry it in to the changing room.

I am not qualified to say whether all this stuff is really necessary, but it 
is the sine qua non of social acceptance of the young, and since I lost that 
status when the Dead Sea wasn't even ill, I'll not comment. I am reminded 
however of an a friend at college who decided to develop his puny physique 
by buying a Bullworker body-building machine. It gathered dust on display in 
the corner of his room for about 6 months at which point he wrote asking for 
his money back, on the grounds that owning it had done nothing for him. The 
reply he got was as dusty as the machine.

What beats me is how the marketing gurus of the sports equipment companies 
can have missed the opportunities for selling specialist equipment to the 
more mature swimmer. I know from experience that beyond a certain age, 
comfort becomes more important than street cred or even speed, and this 
should be the guiding principle. For example, what is worse than getting in 
to a cold wet costume? Surely it is not beyond the whit of science to design 
a costume warmer which would deliver a warmly caressing garment to the 
nether regions. While swimming you could put your socks in there. There is 
no treat greater than hot socks, once you are over 40 that is.

That made me think of the anti-verruca rubber socks you sometimes see in 
changing rooms. A wider market exists for lightweight wellingtons to get you 
through the foot bath without getting your feet cold and wet. Similarly a 
pack-down umbrella could be designed to keep those silly pool showers off 
you. Ordinary boots and umbrellas are not acceptable - I know as I've been 
asked to stop using mine.

I see now that goggle designers are spending thousands to reduce the already 
minuscule drag in the water caused by turbulence around the eye sockets. In 
my book the money would be better spent on developing goggles you can 
actually see through. I have yet to find a pair of anti-mist goggles which 
stay anti-mist for more that two swims. The solution is obvious. The only 
thing which cured condensation on my windows at home was double glazing, so 
how long before double glazed goggles? The only drawback might be the number 
of phone calls you would get from people trying to sell them.

Another tendency which increases with age is the frequency with which one 
gets overtaken in the pool. A useful accoutrement to help with this would be 
a rear view mirror, mounted on the shoulder, so you could move aside if the 
overtaker was a friend, or aim your kick if otherwise.

As for these cow-teat drinking bottles swimmers all suck at, I am not 
impressed. They ruin a gin and tonic, and beer goes flat in them. So here's 
another marketing opportunity - a Portable Poolside Teasmade for during the 
swim, and an automatic pint of Guinness which pours itself and stands to 
settle five minutes before you get out. There must be a way.

Another useful gizmo for the discerning swimmer would be a portable Corby 
trouser press. As many changing rooms suffer the vandalism of having all the 
pegs pulled off the wall, clothes often have to be stuffed in to lockers or 
left lying on benches. This is not a problem for youths as it generally 
improves the look of the sort of things they wear. It's not so welcome 
however if you are wearing a month's salary of suit, shoes etc., and you may 
be off to see a customer soon after. I have never seen a Corby trouser press 
anywhere except in hotel rooms. Strange that.

Whilst in the changing room, a special mirror for senior swimmers would be a 
good idea. Many, like me, are the wide bodied type, but don't want to be 
reminded of it. Consequently it is common to see us in front of the mirrors 
twisting our torsos like Sharron Davies when there's a camera about, to try 
to look thinner. The slipped disks this leads to must surely be a drain on 
the economy. It would therefore save the National Health Service a fortune 
if they paid to have fairground mirrors installed in the changing rooms. The 
sort that make you look thin would be just the ticket.

Going in to a business meeting with goggle marks can be off-putting to 
customers, so another accessory for the Business Swimmer could be false 
glasses to hide behind. Those who already wear spectacles are catered for, 
but for those who don't - just think! Not only could you hide your goggle 
marks, you could do imitations of Brains from Thunderbirds when the meeting 
began to get boring. If your goggle marks were particularly bad you could 
add a false nose and moustache to the glasses, and do a Groucho Marx.

Of course many of these things could be made unnecessary if one could afford 
a butler to attend you when swimming. Alas that is beyond the purse of most 
mortals. It might not work anyway, after all, look at the young. They have 
better than a butler - they have a parent, and yet still they seem to need 
all that gear. That's the problem of getting old, I just don't understand.


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